Journey of a Medical Consultant who walked an arduous path to serve the common man – Part 2

After her tenure at the Polonnaruwa Base Hospital, she held the position of Consultant Physician at the Colombo North Teaching Hospital in Ragama, where she conducted extensive research on alcohol and drug dependence as well as leptospirosis. Thereafter she dedicated 22 years of her career to the Sri Jayawardenepura General Hospital before retiring in 2015, after 42 years of service to the government of Sri Lanka. She is currently practicing as a senior consultant physician at Asiri Medical Hospital in Colombo. As of now she has dedicated over fifty years to her career in the medical field.

She was chosen to present six medical orations and made history as the first woman to deliver the S.C. Paul oration with her talk titled “Malaria – The Scourge of Polonnaruwa.” Additionally, she received the Wijerama award for the best scientific paper at the centenary congress of the SLMA for her presentation on “Neurological Complications of Malaria in the Polonnaruwa District.” In this paper she noted febrile fits, acute cerebellar syndrome, toxic confusional state, cerebral malaria, Guillain-Barre syndrome, extra pyramidal tremor, delayed psychosis, as reversible myopathy neurological complications due to malaria.

I had the privilege of attending the Deshabandu Dr. C.G. Uragoda MBBS(Ceylon), MD(Ceylon), Honorary D.Sc (Colombo), FRCP (Edinburgh) and FRCP (Glasgow) Oration on the History of Medicine, titled “History of Malaria in Sri Lanka: The Scourge of Nine Centuries,” delivered by Dr. Anula Wijesundere on February 26, 2025, at the Lionel Memorial Auditorium, Sri Lanka Medical Association. It is quite remarkable to observe that both Deshbandu Dr. C.G. Uragoda and my late father, Dr. D.V.H. Silva, were born in the same year, 1928. They both attended Mahinda College in Galle and Ananda College in Colombo concurrently, and they also enrolled in the Colombo Medical Faculty at the same time, although they later pursued different medical specialties.

During the Deshabandu Dr. C.G. Uragoda Oration, Dr Anula Wijesundere commented that malaria could be a potentially fatal disease if diagnosis and treatment are delayed. Dr. Anula Wijesundere provided a comprehensive overview of malaria’s history from a global perspective, detailing its spread. She systematically outlined the measures implemented to limit the transmission of the disease by controlling mosquito populations and reducing human contact with these vectors, employing both chemical and non-chemical strategies.

She said in the years 1986 to 1988 Sri Lanka experienced malaria as an epidemic and was the leading cause of all government hospital admissions. She said that during this period in Polonnaruwa 30% of hospital admissions were due to malaria. During this period, she conducted extensive research on malaria patients.

(To be Continued)

By Dharshan Silva
CEO, Abans Finance PLC
Continued from Yesterday